2020 Season Preview
Great Neck South Looks To Remain Competitive In American League
by Tony Genualdo Uncommitted junior Phil Menist (Great Neck South) pitching against Oyster Bay yesterday pic.twitter.com/bmR6RmWjY9 — Axcess Baseball LI (@axcessbaseball) March 30, 2019 Great Neck South’s season last year was a very positive one. They came into the season with a young group of players moving into Class A from county wide, but they stayed competitive in the games that they played. Coach Ciro Ambrosio reflects on last season. “We competed against the much stronger teams in our league, losing some close games because we were not as deep as them,” Ambrosio said. “In our league, it’s always an uphill battle.” They hope to battle again this season with their returning players. Among those are seniors Phil Menist (Babson College), Eric Madenberg (Binghamton), and Adrian Balkcom. ...
Can West Islip Continue Their ‘Even-Year’ Trend?
Over the course of his tenure, Shawn Rush has established West Islip as the model of consistency in terms of Suffolk County baseball programs. Since 2008, they have captured four Suffolk County Championships and two Long Island Championships. Last season, they once again captured their league title and made a deep postseason run but ran into a terrific Ward Melville team led by the Carl Yastrzemski Award winner, Max Nielsen. “I’m pretty proud of the group – the seniors did a nice job,” said Rush. “The ultimate goal is to win a county championship every year but that’s not always attainable. We reached the semifinals, it was a disappointing ending but we just got beat. We faced the Yastrzemski Award winner and he showed why,” he said, referencing th...
Islip Looking To Rebound In Year 2 Under RJ Going
by Zevan Shuster Heading into the 2020 season, Islip head coach RJ Going expects a much improved team from the campaign prior. “Last year, I thought we were just going to take off. We had a bunch of seniors, we had a few kids going to college (to play baseball), but we had to deal with a few injuries early in the season, including to one of our better pitchers,” Going said. Out of the 20 games Going’s club played last year, a staggering 16 were a one or two run game heading into the sixth. Clearly, the margin for error is small, and the need for execution is extraordinarily high. Islip wound up compiling a record of 4-16. “The expectations for us this year is to just win those one or two-run games. We have to flip the script,” said Going. “This year, we set up seven scrimmages before ...
What Can Connetquot Do For An Encore?
Connetquot is the 2019 Suffolk AA Champs ! They will face Massapequa in the Long Island Championship on Saturday pic.twitter.com/DVn38w3IzF — Axcess Baseball LI (@axcessbaseball) June 4, 2019 Entering the 2019 season – his first as head coach – Robert Burger knew he had a talented team with sky-high expectations. “The challenge for the coaching staff was how are we going to keep these guys grounded? After that Commack series, we kind of got on a roll. We set up small goals for ourselves – win the league, get a high playoff seed and get our pitching staff ready, which was the strength of the team. I’m extremely proud of how well they handled adversity,” said Burger. As we know, they defeated Ward Melville in a classic three-game series to capture the Suff...
Herricks Ready To Compete In Nassau Class A American League
Led by the heroics of Matt Yip, Herricks was one of the pleasant surprises in the year 2019. The power-hitting catcher led Nassau County with seven HR; including two in the postseason. Herricks finished with a record of 11-7 during the regular season, but was eliminated by Hewlett in a one-run game. Losing Yip – a finalist for the coveted Diamond Award – will be a challenge for the team. He was named All-County. They also graduated All-Conference 1B Mike Scordo, who is now at West Florida. Head Coach Rich Bizelia, now in his 10th season, knows this season will be an uphill battle as they will be extremely young. But with great challenge comes great opportunity and they have that with the new re-alignment. They will be in the American League of Nassau County Class A which will a...
Bethpage Looks To Build Off Deep Postseason Run in 2019
(Photo Credit: Bethpage Baseball) by Tony Genualdo FINAL: Bethpage 15 VSN 1 Bethpage is headed to the semifinals! pic.twitter.com/Mm65QFvns5 — Axcess Baseball LI (@axcessbaseball) May 21, 2019 Last year, Bethpage were on the verge of heading to the Nassau County Class A championship in what was one of the program’s most successful seasons. The only team standing in their way was a team who has made perennial playoff runs; Division. Unfortunately for Bethpage, they could not sneak past them as Division would move on to their second straight Class A championship game. In a cruel twist of fate, the game went 14 innings with the teams fighting tooth-and-nail until Division broke through with a four-spot in the 14th. Despite the season ending prematurely, that should not diminish what the...
Northport Returns Strong Core of Impact Players
Northport came up one win shy of a postseason berth last year, but expectations are high entering 2020 due to their large contingent of returning impact players. “Almost our entire team is back from last year,” said head coach Sean Lynch. “With the exception of All-League 3B Trent Mayer and pitcher Kevin Rooney,” he added. University of Charleston-commit Larry Citrola is their big bat and will also anchor the rotation. He was recruited as a two-way player and Lynch called him “one of the most athletic kids at Northport” and that he will play the field on the two days that he doesn’t pitch. He may potentially play on the left side of the infield. Accompanying him in the middle of the order is CF Colin Shashaty, who batted over .400 but just missed o...
Centereach Hopes Improved Defense Will End Postseason Drought
It has been 10 years since Centereach‘s last postseason berth. They have come tantalizingly close the past two seasons, as they came up just one win shy of the mandatory 10 victories to clinch a berth. “Two years in a row we’ve needed to win just one game and I think about it everyday,” said Head Coach Pete Cammarata, who is entering his third year at the helm. He was previously the assistant since 2004. “I’m always thinking what kind of change or tweak we need to make to win one more game. That’s in my thought process all the time,” he added. One aspect of the team that he feels is upgraded is the team’s defense – which was their undoing the previous two seasons. “Defensively we will be a good team – we will catch the...
Whitman Looks to Make It Three Straight Playoff Trips Led By Two Division-I Arms
It was certainly a wild season in 2019 for Whitman. After beginning the season 0-4, they quickly completely turned the tables and won 10 of 11 qualifying for a postseason berth in the loaded League II. What turned it around? “We were up 3-1 against Sachem North in the last inning and gave it up to go to 0-4,” said Coach Keith Barrett. “After that, we went on a run. We won a couple one-run games and then the winning was contagious. We expected to win after a while. Also, we made some changes in the lineup and really took off,” he added. After their incredible streak, they had the misfortune of drawing a bracket with Longwood and Smithtown East. They drew Adelphi-commit Steven Murphy (Longwood) and SUNY Oswego-commit Jai Sharma (Smithtown East) and lost both games fac...
Bellport Looks To Build For Future
It was a tumultuous 2019 season for Bellport. They fell to 4-11 in league play and were without legendary head coach Bill Batewell, who was on medical leave. In his absence, longtime assistant Joe Murphy was at the helm. He has been with Batewell for 41 seasons beginning in 1979 as a volunteer coach on JV level at Sachem, then as the 8th grade coach in 1980, freshman team in 1981 and 1982, JV for 15 years and then varsity assistant since then. He noted that they had some bad luck, losing three one-run ballgames including two to League Champ West Islip by the scores of 1-0. “We were in a lot of games, we pitched well we just did not hit well,” he said, adding that the team batting average was under .200. They had one All-County player and that was Andrew Veit, who is currently p...
Wheatley Primed To Contend For Class B Championship
Despite coming off a season that was not up to their usual standard, Wheatley head coach Paul Paino’s expectations for this upcoming season have not changed one bit. “We’d one six championships in ten years, but then we had an off season last year, where we didn’t even make the playoffs. We missed it by one game. So we’re looking to get back on track,” Paino said. “We certainly hope to. We have a good group of kids coming up.” First and foremost, Paino will be counting on his two senior captains to lead the team, if they are going to go get to where they hope to go. Both named Nick, one Nick Sampogna, the other Nick Papageorge. “They’re going to be the team leaders,” said Paino. “Nick Papageorge is an infielder and a middle of the lineup hitter. He’s one of the better players on Long Isl...
Southampton Enters 2020 In a New League With New Head Coach
(Photo Credit: Michelle Malone) Southampton has enjoyed a fair amount of success in the past decade winning two New York State Class B Championships and regularly qualifying for the postseason. Now they enter a new decade with a new challenge of moving up to Class A (League 7) and doing so with a new Head Coach. Zach Epley, who is a Southampton graduate and spent four of the past six years as the JV coach was promoted to varsity this season when Scott Johnson stepped down after a successful tenure. When discussing the season, Epley noted that pitching will be “pretty strong.” They will be returning three starting pitchers with experience at the varsity level. Sam Schneider, who impressed at our showcase back in January with a fastball that sat 79-80 MPH with a great 12-6 breaki...
